Lav Lends Thoughts On Big East

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According to reports, the seven Big East Catholic schools met with Big East commissioner Mike Aresco on Sunday to discuss the future of the conference and the possibility of other options for the schools.

St. John’s, as one of the seven schools and an original founding member of the Big East, finds itself right in the middle of the discussions. These talks focus around the possibilities of a new TV contract, according to ajerseyguy.com.

“[Women’s basketball head coach] Joe Tartamella and myself have had productive discussions with [University president] Fr. Harrington and [Athletic Director] Chris Monasch concerning the latest developments that have come to light with the Big East Conference,” St. John’s head coach Steve Lavin said in a statement. “We have shared our perspective with Fr. Harrington and Chris as St. John’s shapes its future basketball aspirations.”

One of the possibilities is a merger with the A-10 conference, which is a basketball-only conference and similar to what the Big East was when it was founded. This outcome, according to ESPN, could either include the addition of the catholic school teams to raise the conference to 21 teams or result in the Big East schools reaching a creative solution including parts of the A-10.

Either way, Lavin believes St. John’s will end up in a positive position following the conclusion of the conference’s realignment.

“St. John’s is uniquely positioned to be successful regardless of the conference realignment outcome,” Lavin said. “It is our belief that we have all the key ingredients to move forward as a basketball program.”